Friday, January 25, 2008

4.5 millions Orphans in Iraq, a tragic situation

Baghdad,Voices of Iraq – (VOI). New reports of Iraqi Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs released in 16 January, 2008 with new disaster numbers of children situation in Iraq. This report was declare that in Iraq now 4.5 millions Iraqi orphans with 500 000 living in streets without any home or family care about thier, as well as there are only 459 orphans in governmental houses of orphans.

The dramatic facts in this report also, there are 800 Iraqi orphans in American Iraqi prisons until January 2008 (700 orphans in Iraqi prisons and 100 another orphans in American prisons.

In a Baghdadi popular market, Mustafa Fadhil, a ten year old child, sits waiting to carry the items purchased by individuals who are out doing their shopping, for some trivial income that he needs to help his family following his father’s death who was a victim of the violence in Iraq. From time to time, Mustafa imagines himself back again in classroom; a dream that disappears when a customer, looking for a carrier, calls him “I left school and started working when my father was killed in a mortar attack that targeted our house around two years ago, and I have been responsible for my family since then,” Mustafa said to Aswat al-Iraq – Voices of Iraq – (VOI). In an attempt to depend on himself in order for himself and his family to survive under such severe circumstances, Mustafa limits his plans to the requirements of daily life. “I stopped thinking about my future, and what I would be when I get older.”

There are many children like Mustafa, orphans and street-kids that live a current tragic reality in Iraq, with an unknown future awaiting them, especially when considering that there are no pre-existing legislations or decrees that protect them and their rights.

The statistics of the Iraqi Ministry of Planning and Development Coordination show that there are 4.5 million orphans in Iraq, 500 thousand of them living in the streets. At one of the intersections of Al-Karada, a Shiite neighborhood in downtown Baghdad – the capital of Iraq, Nassir Saadon, a 14 years old teenager, sells candy. “I live in a tragic situation and poverty, because my parents were divorced around two years ago,” adding, “I chose to sell candy because it is a job that doesn’t require a large amount of money, but the income is hardly enough to feed me. I feel that my future is unknown; if I even have a future.”

The Islamic Foundation of Woman and Child, a non-governmental organization, believes that with the current tragic circumstances of children in Iraq, a generation will grow up cultivated in an atmosphere of rebellious violence. Amal Kashefal-Ghetaa, the president of that foundation, explained that “Due to the current situation, a massive change took place in the lives of children that forced many of them to leave their schools and friends to go to work; a matter that affects them mentally.”

The Iraqi government, according to Kashefal-Ghetaa, “is not sponsoring those children, despite the fact that the social component representing them is getting wider, because of the violence in Iraq;” demanding the legislation of laws that sponsor these children.

The Iraqi Parliamentary Committee of Woman and Child have a pessimistic vision regarding the future of children in Iraq. Naddera Aif, a parliamentary member of this committee and affiliated with the Iraqi Accordance Front (IAF) told VOI “I have a pessimistic vision regarding the future of families in Iraq, due to the current violence, displacement, poverty, and family fragmentation. There are 4.5 million orphans, in addition to 800 children in prisons, 700 of them in the Iraqi detentions, and the rest in American custody, all accused of terror or issuing false statements.”

According to Aif, the Parliamentary Committee of Woman and Child recently suggested a number of laws in that regard, such as the laws of Orphans Fund, The Childhood Fund, and the Organization of Childhood Sponsorship, “These laws represent a temporary solution that will be discussed by the Iraqi parliament in this year,” Aif said without further details.

The Orphanages Department at the Iraqi Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs considers that childhood in Iraq suffers the loss of rights comparing with their counterparts in the neighboring countries. “Kids in Iraq are deprived of health care in schools, playing with their friends, and the right to self-expression,” Abeer Al-Chalabi, the manager of that department said to VOI, adding that many children in Iraq are subjected to sexual harassment, some of them are conducting hard jobs unsuitable to their ages, and others use begging to earn their living.

In Iraq, as al-Chalabi confirmed, there are 18 orphanages, 4 in Baghdad, and the rest are distributed throughout other provinces. The total number of orphans in all these orphanages is 459.

The sociologist, Atheer Kareem, told VOI that the negative situation that children in Iraq are experiencing will increase their suffering, unless the government in Iraq responds by issuing legislations that sponsors them and protects their rights. “Violence and bloodshed will have negative mental effects on kids, and their personality, and it would be difficult for a generation to grow up in a healthy manner without the required environments.” [Source]

28 Comments:

Anonymous said...

Khalid, it sounds like the article is sometimes refering to children who have lost only one parent ("only" as if it were a small thing, but having one parent is still much better than no parent at all) as orphans. Though in many areas where it is all but impossible for the mother to work, financially the fall out is the same, perhaps worse as the child now must feed themselves and an adult.Is your mother creating a new foundation to help the orphans? Perhaps an Islamic version of "Save the Children"?I'll hope you'll post more...seb

Sallam Khalid,My heart has always gone out to orphans. In fact, these are some of the people that, Insha'Allah I want to live my life to help. It's tragic to hear of all of the victims in war. Yet children al young suffering so harshly it breaks my heart. Conversely I am mad for so many reasons. My tax dollars used in ways I hate. I'm irate! Then I think of the oil rich neighboring nations. Where is their aid? Muslims and others should be foster parents, and care for orphans. Peace~sallam, aisha

On the subject of statistics, the Lancet Report has been exposed as a farce. Do you think you owe the Iraq the Model bloggers an apology? You called them "traitors". But the Lancet Report was designed and released for an American political agenda only...well, apparently a Sadrist agenda as well. So perhaps the real traitor is someone who gleefully gobbled up that sham study.

Fools who call the Lancet study a sham, don't understand math, statistics or what the study was measuring. It measured the increase in deaths, not just deaths directly caused by the violence of the war, but just the increase over all. The methodology and researchers produced numbers still used for many African studies, but the political fall out of the Iraqi study suddenly makes these respected people suspect.I'm tired of people bashing the Lancet study. Something like 90% of the households reporting deaths had the death certificate.The most recent study ONLY measures the violent deaths directly due to the war. It doesn't address deaths of diabetics who could no longer get insulin, people with kidney disease who could not get to dialysis or found the machines broken or destroyed, people with heart disease or high blood pressure who could no longer get their medicatios along with cancer patients dying without chemo, children born at home rather than risk the check points between home and the hospital, or even the cut in food rations and deaths caused by that.Get over it. Learn to read the whole study and pay attention to what is being measured.seb

Iraq's health ministry calculated that, based on death certificates, 50,000 Iraqis had died in the war through June 2006.

The survey teams said they confirmed most deaths by examining government-issued death certificates, but they took no photographs of those certificates. "Confirmation of deaths through death certificates is a linchpin for their story," Spagat told NJ. "But they didn't record (or won't provide) information about these death certificates that would make them traceable. Under pressure from critics, the authors did release a disk of the surveyors' collated data, including tables showing how often the survey teams said they requested to see, and saw, the death certificates. But those tables are suspicious, in part, because they show data-heaping, critics said. For example, the database reveals that 22 death certificates for victims of violence and 23 certificates for other deaths were declared by surveyors and households to be missing or lost. That similarity looks reasonable, but Spagat noticed that the 23 missing certificates for nonviolent deaths were distributed throughout eight of the 16 surveyed provinces, while all 22 missing certificates for violent deaths were inexplicably heaped in the single province of Nineveh. That means the surveyors reported zero missing or lost certificates for 180 violent deaths in 15 provinces outside Nineveh. The odds against such perfection are at least 10,000 to 1, Spagat told NJ. Also, surveyors recorded another 70 violent deaths and 13 nonviolent deaths without explaining the presence or absence of certificates in the database.

[seb] Fools who call the Lancet study a sham, don't understand math, statistics or what the study was measuring.

I suggest you read the National Journal article and the WSJ's follow-up article before saying anything else so embarrassig. The Lancet Survey used such a scant number of clusters that a single death represented 2000 extrapolated deaths. That means a single error represented a 200,000% percent error in the total. Combined this with 1) the lack of supervision of the surveyors, 2) the extreme bias of those commissioning the study, 3) the connections between Sadr with Lafta who assemble the survey teams, 4) the suspicious nature of the survey's methodology, and you have a report that is worth what the Lancet Report is worth. Far less than nothing.

Oh and, traitors they are, not for this particular issue only, but for nearly ever post and every word they ever wrote, supporting the occupation of their own country, justifying its crimes and marketing tis agendas, traitors in every meaning that word has.

LOL! How typical of the terrorists' news service that they repeated the canard of the Lancet Report without mentioning that it had been debunked. Will we have to wait 14 months for *new* phony survey to be exposed?

Here's a better question: Will it matter since people who consume this crap don't care about reality. Iraqi blogger Nabris Kazimi is right that rejectionist Sunni Arabs are the real Iraqi masters at publicity.

What is amazing to me is that what the Lancet study uncovered was a black market business in death certificates.

I mean with all the ministries broken, no electricity, no water, the streets not getting clean, almost no government services at all, yet the people that issue death certificates are running at 110%. Every one has a death certificate for their dead family. It's a farces if I have ever seen one.

cmar, Nibras who?:)see for those who actually know anything about Iraqi or speak Arabic, Kazimi isnt an Arabic word, its a farisi one, so he is either really Irani, not Iraqi, or he his name is Kathimi, but writes it Kazimi because he is an Irani wanna-be and that says it all :) so much for the credibility of your resources!

more to come about the lancet report.

Madtom, go figure! the only numbers in production of anything that area ctually increasing in post-war iraq are the numbers of dead buddies and their death certificates!

now tell me something Tom, why would anyone want a fake death certificate? as in go to the area where they make false documents (which is a dangerous one) and risk your life and pay a good deal of money to get a death certificate? for what reason? just to shame the occupation forces? believe me the every-moment daily life of Iraqis is enough shame for the occupation itself.

Well Khalid if you remember the US was making payment for wrongful death and so was the Iraqi government, so there was economic incentive to have a death certificate.

Can you explain how it is that with the government in total disarray the people that issue death certificates could possibly have such a track record. Many people that disappeared where never even identified, much less issued official death certificates.

Anyway it turns out that I was most likely wrong all along. The people that wrote the Lancet report most likely just made the numbers up out of thin air. They have no evidence to back up their results, and the number look like fraud, one province had 100% missing papers, while the rest had 90% papers...the numbers look fraudulent. Anyway they have no records to back up their claims, they took no pictures, made no copies, took down no registration numbers..not good.

believe me, it takes a current irani, or a seriously irani wanna-be to say the things that dude says, actualy it takes an Irani living in the US to say them, and look at his photo, see his beard? thats a trade mark for irani-wanna bees, its an unmistakable mark.

and yeah Tom, i heard of the guy, i did wipe the floor with him in a debate amongs bloggers only a year ago or so, thats when he disappeared and never replied, and thats when i never heard of his name after, and i really never heard hsi name before that debate too. what i meant is that you really shouldnt use him as a reference, being an iraqi racist pro war some-guy just started bloging at like the begining of 2006. neither the credibility nor the experience to be a reference.

its cute though how Tom thinks that he could know about the iraqi blog sphere more than i do:) its amusing:) and considering our long history together of your lack of information, i think i am the one that invented that statement of you having to go out more,now didnt i Tom? now thats a violation to UN resolution number ***2$%#%^ which says you cant use a guy's made-up statement against him, or have you missed learning about that rule too?

oh and speaking of disappearing, Tom havent we had a gentlmen deal that you wouldnt show up in my blog or email inbox anymore long time ago? what happend to that?

the original subject is the 4.5 million orphans, not anyones new post about an issue thoroughly hashed over you are back to regurgitate. you are just dying to get people to visit your lame ass blog that only little cheney humpers visit.

how pray tell do you get 4.6 million orphans out of only 100 thousand dead iraqis? or is VOI lying?

The most recent study ONLY measures the violent deaths directly due to the war

not quite, no cigar. The most recent study ONLY measures the violent deaths OF CIVILIANS directly due to the war. MEN DON'T COUNT. don't you know whenever men die they are terrorists, or insugents....usually only women and children in iraq are considered civilians. unless they are american puppets.

Well if Iraqis Arab brothers would just stop coming to Iraq to kill Iraqis, there would not be so many orphans. Take it up with the Arab league or the Arab association of your choice. And of course don't let the "Glorious Iraqi Resistance" off the hook either, they have the worst aim of any army in the history of the world. They have managed to kill one million* Iraqis, and make 4.5 million* orphans, and I think 4 million* displaced, and somehow only managed to hit a handful of Americans.

Or maybe they actually target Iraqis on purpose, and make deals with the Americans for their own safety, and/or profit, and to help keep their own power bace at home.

due to my lack of itnerest in wasting time talking to cmar and madtom, i decided to just not reply:) i have no interest in wasting time talking to either of them because they have no interest in dealing with the Iraq tragedy as the tragedy that it is, it just sounds like one big joke to them, and a way to spend time online and have fun and get soem lights and attention, and of course demonstrate their lasck of respect for lost Iraqi lives.

and that i cant tolerate, i can tolerate assholes in my personal life. but assholes that take lightly the lost lives of iraqi people, and assholes that want to turn the issue into a debate about numbers instead of taking responsibility and working on stopping the mess thier country caused and the lives they are responsible of destroying, those i am not going to tolerate, and instead of allowing them to use this blog as a theatre to their plays and assholeness, and a play ground for personal attacks, i am going to delete their comments on the spot.

so my advice is: write your comments wisely and respectfuly, or they will be deleted, cmar, as for tom, we already had an agreement months ago, a gentlmen agreement that we wish each other well but that he will disappear from my blog, because he can never, ever focus on the subject and always steers the discussions away of the original posts to some dumb aspect, serving as a distraction tool that i dont welcome, so madtom, as we agreed before, as i told you before, long months ago, if you dont respect our agreement i will delete your comments whenever they arrive. and since you havent respected our agreement, this is whats going to happen now, you have been warned many times through the years, and you got your three strikes now, cmar is still playing, but lets hope he will become nice and polite or otherwise will be sent to the bench too.

and are right annie dear, you are totally right: the original subject is the 4.5 million orphans.

[khalid] due to my lack of itnerest in wasting time talking to cmar and madtom, i decided to just not reply:)

Perhaps that is what happened with Nabris Kazimi when he saw how pointless it was to talk to someone who gaged an Iraqi's loyalty by the etymology of a name. Particularly, when he was talking to someone who only got Iraqi citizenship on 2004 and chose to boycott the elections of his own new country.

[khalid]{cmar ii has} no interest in dealing with the Iraq tragedy as the tragedy that it is

Actually, I'm not interested in making up problems for Iraqis to benefit non-Iraqi political parties (nor ANTI-Iraqi political parties in Syria). We think differently about that, but if I were you, I wouldn't sling the word "traitor" around too freely.

This is anand here i live in india and have been reading your familys blogs for quite some time.You are luckier than other ordinary iraqis because yourself and your other siblins and mother have access professional education as compared to other iraqis.Thanks for your blogs it opens the eyes of the world to what is happening.if you are starting a project for helping ordinary iraqis for education and other purposes kindly set up a payment gateway so that i and my friends can contribute through credit card.We would be glad to send in our contributions however small be the amount.We want to see your country back on the road of peace and prosperity.May god inshallah bless you and your family especially your mother.May peace be on you as i write this comment.

Sometimes, I try to be careful of what I put on my blog. In this case of children from Iraq, I remember when I worked (temporarily for an ESL program) that was provided by JVS Jewish Vocational Services. Don't comment on that, but I saw a memo on a desk that said that they were going to make the Afghani children into Christians.

Ok, this is one thing, another thing is for some reason, orphans are often targets for adoption agences, which profit big from these poor children.

I don't know, I am rambling, it's 4:46 am I am just waiting for the muathin to call the athan.

Still, tell us how to help. Force us, the little people to do something